Fireflies in December

by Jennifer Erin Valent

I tugged at her shirt to get her moving. “Come on. Let’s get you out of the rain.”

  I managed to get her into the truck and wrap her with the blanket Daddy kept on the floor for Momma to cover her legs with when we went into town on cold days. “Where’s your momma and daddy?” I asked her. “Were they in the house?”

  Gemma just sat there shivering with the blanket clutched around her. Her face made me nervous. The feeling I had inside made me nervous too. And when I finally saw Daddy coming back to the truck, my fears were confirmed. He was wet to the bone, his face drawn longer than I’d ever seen it, and his steps were slow like his feet were too heavy to move. I stared at him while Gemma put her head down to hide it behind the blanket, and I kept staring at him until his eyes met mine. The look in his eyes said it all.

  Momma must have got word out to the neighbors because trucks started pulling up to the burning house just then. As people began climbing out and yelling to each other about what to do, Daddy put his hands out toward them and shook his head sadly.

  One of the men who came was Luke Talley. I remember how he walked over to Daddy and started talking, words I couldn’t hear, and how his shoulders slumped after he heard what Daddy had to say. He stood there in the rain, his hat wet and droopy, shaking his head just like Daddy had done. Luke said something else and Daddy replied, nodding toward the truck as he did so.

  Through my tears I could see Luke glance at me, his face looking like I felt. He stared at me for a second and then tugged at the front of his hat in a sad hello. I gave him a nod back and put my arm protectively around Gemma.

  That was the day that Gemma came to live with us.

  Chapter 4

  That drive home after the fire was the longest of my life, with Gemma and Daddy both sitting still and quiet beside me.

  Getting home wasn’t much better, with Momma crying and Daddy pacing the porch. Once Momma got hold of herself, she started rushing about fixing things for Gemma, which I think she did mostly to keep her mind busy. But Gemma didn’t want any apple tart or milk. She didn’t want a bath or a pair of my pajamas. She didn’t want anything, and she didn’t say anything. H y er silence worried me more than I’d ever been worried.

  I helped Gemma out of her sooty clothes and into my best nightgown. She never said a word until I fluffed up my pillow and steered her into my bed.

  “This is your bed,” she mumbled to me.

  “So?”

  “Where will you sleep?”

  “Right there beside you,” I said, pointing to a makeshift bed Momma had made on the floor out of a couple sheets and blankets. It was supposed to be for Gemma, that bed on the floor, but I wouldn’t have it. If anyone needed a good sleep that night, it was Gemma. “That way I’ll be here if you need anythin’.”

  “The floor’s hard,” Gemma said. “You won’t sleep.”

  “I can sleep anywhere. When the horse was sick, I slept in the barn.”

  She didn’t argue any more after that. She was too tired to, I figured.

  The next two days were a blur of phone calls and people dropping by to give their sympathies. A lot of people brought over food too, sometimes including a little something sweet for me and Gemma. But Gemma wouldn’t eat barely anything. She was quiet and strange, something Momma told me probably wouldn’t go away for a while. She told me I had to be patient.

  I couldn’t get rid of the pain in my stomach. It hurt all the time, but especially when I saw Gemma’s face or thought about her poor momma and daddy. Momma told me my stomachache would go away eventually too, just like Gemma’s strangeness.

  The funeral was on a Tuesday. It didn’t rain at all. Instead it was a beautiful day, sunny and not too warm. I’d always thought rain was more appropriate for the gloominess of a funeral. The Reverend Wright from Gemma’s church said some nice words about Miss Opal and Mr. Joe and told us that we should be rejoicing because they were with Jesus. I figured that was true, but I still felt bad for Gemma. After all, she’d been left behind.

  There weren’t too many white people at the funeral, and those of us who were there stood on one side of the graves while the colored people stood on the other. Except, of course, that Gemma stood with us. Gemma didn’t have any other family that anyone knew of, so it was only her church family who were there to tell her they were sorry. She still wasn’t talking much, so my momma thanked the well-wishers for her.

  Luke was one of the last people to come up to Gemma. “Your daddy helped me fix up my house. He was a fine man, and I’m glad I got to know him.” He put his hand on Gemma’s shoulder and then looked at me. “You’re a good friend to her. You keep on takin’ care of her now, ya hear?”

  “I will,” I reassured him. “I always will.”

  Some of the people at the funeral came by to have supper on our lawn, but it was the saddest supper I’d ever had, and no one ate much.

  By the time things got settled down, we were all tuckered, and Gemma and I went upstairs early. After seeing her to bed, I crawled into my pajamas, but I couldn’t think of sleeping yet, so I headed downstairs for some milk. My parents were on the porch, and I could hear their voices floating in through the open windows.

  “You can’t be thinkin’ right, Harley,” Momma was saying, her voice barely above a whisper. “There ain’t no way that would work. There just ain’t no way.”

  “The girl ain’t got no one else. She done lost everythin’.”

  “She has to have some family somewhere.”

  I made my way to the stool that sat in front of the den window and peeked over the sill to spy on them. I could see Momma walking back and forth in her bare feet, her arms tightly folded against the chilly evening breeze.

  “She ain’t got no one, I’m tellin’ you,” my daddy said. “I promised Joe Teague I’d look out for his girl if somethin’ ever happened.”

  Momma stooped down in front of the chair where my daddy sat and looked up at him. “You’ve got to understand. There won’t be no gettin’ by for us if we do this. People will talk.”

  “I don’t care about what those people say, Sadie.” Daddy took my momma’s hands in his and leaned forward to get his face closer to hers. “You know I ain’t never cared about people’s idle talk. Never have. I ain’t gonna start now.”

  “It just . . . ain’t . . . done!” Momma said almost desperately.

  “Just because something ain’t done don’t mean it shouldn’t be.”

  Momma stood and started to pace again. “You’d best think about your family,” she said, sounding angry now. “You’d best think about your daughter.”

  “Jessilyn loves Gemma. She’d take her as a sister; you know that.”

  “But what will other children say? Buddy Pernell almost killed Jessilyn the other day. What do you think those boys might do if they find out she’s got a colored girl livin’ with her?” Momma whispered those last words like she knew someone was eavesdropping.

  “Jessilyn can take care of herself. She’s always been on Gemma’s side. She won’t care if she gets ribbin’ from them boys.”

  “I ain’t talkin’ about ribbin’. There’s violence from people about mixin’ colors.”

  Daddy seemed like he’d had enough talking, and he sighed loudly before walking over to my momma, taking her little face in his big hands. “Sadie, I told that man I’d watch out for his daughter if anythin’ happened. We’re as close to family as she’s got.” He looked at her steadily and with a voice full of firm decision said, “The girl’s stayin’.”

  Momma backed away from him. “Then let it be on your head what happens for it, Harley Lassiter. If unhappy times come to this family through your decision, I’ll not take the blame for it.”

  “Sadie, I never asked you to take the blame. I ain’t never asked you to take the blame for none of my decisions.”

  Momma stood looking at him for about a minute before she marched to the door and into the house.

  I bolted up the stairs quick as a hare, making sure to jump
over the creaky step near the top, just before Momma let the door slam behind her.

  I didn’t sleep much that night. All I could think about was why my momma wouldn’t want Gemma staying with us. Ever since the tragedy, I had assumed that she would stay and be part of our family. I’d never met another soul who claimed to be kin to her, and she’d been living on our farm for as long as I could remember. I couldn’t see any reason why she should leave.

  Now, I knew that there had always been certain ideas about colored people and white people mixing. Not one colored person went to my church or my school, and Phil the barber had a sign in his window that said Whites Only. I knew all about some people not wanting to be friends with other people just because of the color of their skin. My momma and daddy had told me about that when I started asking questions. But Momma had always agreed with Daddy that such talk was ridiculous and that people are people no matter what they look like or where they come from. To hear her speak to my daddy like she did made me worry and started that stomachache hurting worse.

  Why would Momma not want Gemma to stay when she had told me herself that God made us all and we were to love everyone the same? I couldn’t figure on it, but I knew one thing: I wanted Gemma to stay more than anything. I didn’t want to send her off to live with strangers or to be put into an orphanage. I’d read books about children in orphanages, and they sounded like horrible places.

  Well, Daddy had told Momma that Gemma was staying. That was settled. But I wondered about what Momma had said about violence, and I started to worry that maybe our lives were getting ready to change.

  My stomach hurt for the rest of the night.

  We lived in a small town where most people knew who we were, and up until that day in June, we were just the Lassiters. But after that day, we were mostly known as the people who took in the colored girl.

  It wasn’t only the white people who thought we were crazy; it was the colored people too. It seemed we were caught up in a game of tug-of-war.

  After a while of having Gemma with us, a few of Momma’s friends came by to “have a chat,” as they put it. I could tell by the few words I heard that they were talking about how wrong it would be to keep Gemma. It didn’t do anything to change Daddy’s mind. Even our minister, Pastor Landry, came to talk to Daddy. I watched from my bedroom window and saw Daddy smiling kindly but shaking his head. I knew that look enough to know that Daddy was probably saying something like, “I understand where you’re comin’ from, but I know what I know, and all I can do is stick to my guns.”

  My daddy hadn’t always seen life the way other people did, so he’d had to say things like that a lot.

  He said the same kind of thing to the people from Gemma’s church who came by to warn him of the trouble he’d cause by keeping her. The colored folk wouldn’t like it any more than the white folk, they told him. Stirring up trouble was all that would come of it, and Gemma would suffer. Only a week passed between the time of the fire and when she officially settled in at our house, but we got a couple months’ worth of complaints.

  Luke was different. He came by to check on us about every other day on his way home from work at the tobacco factory, always bringing some treat for me and Gemma. Some days he’d bring flowers he’d picked in the meadow on his travels home; other days he’d bring a stick of chewing gum or a piece of penny candy. Momma said he was spoiling us, but she really knew it was his way of showing how sorry he was. Most days he would stay to supper, considering that he was on his own and had no one to cook for him.

  “A man ought to have a hot meal to come home to,” Momma would tell Luke when he’d say she was being too kind to him. “I ain’t doin’ nothin’ but what any woman should.” And then she would follow that proclamation by saying, “Now, you sit on down here, Luke Talley, and fill that stomach before you go weak and scrawny.”

  I was convinced that Luke would never be weak. To me, he was the strongest man alive, aside from Daddy of course. In the last few weeks, I’d been seeing the world a bit differently. I wasn’t sure if it was because I’d turned thirteen or if it was because of what I’d been through with Gemma, but I was starting to feel different. I told Momma as much one day as I helped her hang the wash.

  “That’s just natural, Jessilyn,” she said around the clothespin she was holding in her mouth. “A girl’s bound to change when she gets closer to womanhood. It’d be odd if you weren’t feelin’ different.”

  “But I ain’t been thirteen for even three weeks. It happens that fast?”

  Momma finished hanging up my nightgown and turned to smile at me. “Daddy’s always tellin’ me I change my ways faster than he can keep track. A woman’s just like that sometimes.”

  “But I ain’t no woman,” I said almost angrily.

  “You may not think so, but you’re gettin’ there, sure enough. I think you just don’t see some things as bein’ womanly changes.”

  “Like what?”

  Momma turned away and grabbed Daddy’s socks to hang before saying, “Oh, like maybe how you’re feelin’ about Luke Talley.”

  As much as I knew that Momma probably had an idea of such things, hearing her say it out loud made my cheeks flush red as a beet. “Momma!”

  “I ain’t sayin’ nothin’ you didn’t already know.”

  “I don’t think nothin’ about Luke Talley,” I lied. “He’s a neighbor, is all.”

  “Uh-huh,” Momma murmured.

  “He ain’t even close to me in age,” I continued to argue, “and I ain’t thinkin’ about boys that way, anyhow.”

  “Well, you’re right about that. He is older than you.” She looked at me and smiled again. “But bein’ sweet on a boy ain’t the same as wantin’ to marry him.”

  “It don’t matter any to me what it means, because I ain’t sweet on nobody.”

  It was then that I heard Luke holler a hello as he turned the corner of the lane. I jumped at the sound of his voice and flushed even redder.

  “It’s just Luke come for supper,” Momma said with a grin. “You know, he usually does come by this time of day. You shouldn’t be so embarrassed to see him.”

  “I ain’t embarrassed.” I turned away from Momma slightly so I could fix my hair without her noticing, but when I turned back around, I found her hanging up my underclothes. “Momma,” I whispered, grabbing them from the line. “There ain’t no call to be hangin’ up my bloomers.”

  “There you are, Jessie girl,” Luke said as he came up behind us. “I brought some stick candy for you and Gemma today.”

  I tucked my underthings quickly under my arm and without turning around said, “Thank you, Luke. I best be gettin’ inside to check on supper.” I tore off toward the house without looking back at him and didn’t emerge from my room until I’d changed into clean clothes and straightened my hair.

  No doubt about it, I was changing.

  Chapter 5

  We were on our way to town in the truck, all four of us, with our dog Duke in the back, and everyone was quiet. Momma and Daddy had been that way since their big argument, and I had started wondering if things would ever get back to normal between them.

  Gemma still wasn’t saying a whole lot, although I had gotten her to start reading with me every night. We’d take turns reading paragraphs, and I figured if it did anything for her, it would get her voice muscles used to working again. I didn’t know if they would quit working altogether, but I had always been a big talker, and I couldn’t imagine a girl not talking for so long without something quitting on her.

  Since everyone else was silent, I didn’t say much either.Besides, I was a little worried about heading into town because I knew how the people of Calloway felt about Gemma being with us. At the back of my mind was Momma’s talk of how people could get violent about mixing colors. I didn’t know what to expect.

  At the least, I figured on hearing some talk. Truth was, I didn’t care what they said any more than my daddy did, but usually when someone in town did some careless talk
ing, I lost my temper and gave them some words back. And that always got me into trouble with Momma.

  I just had a feeling that I’d be getting a tongue-lashing after this trip.

  Even Duke was quiet except for when he saw a fox run past the truck. After about ten barks, Daddy shut him up with a holler, and then the rest of the trip was as boring as the first part.

  When we got into town, Daddy sent me and Gemma off to the general store with a list so we could do the shopping while Momma got her hair done and Daddy got the farming supplies.

  Before we left, Daddy pulled me aside. “Don’t let nobody push you around, Jessilyn. You hear? Let people say what they say. It don’t mean nothin’ to us; ain’t that right?”

  “I don’t care if people say things about us.” I looked over at Gemma, where she leaned against the truck. “Ain’t no reason Gemma shouldn’t be treated like anyone else.”

  “No there ain’t, but that won’t change the fact that we’re gonna hear it from people. Now, you get on in that store, get what you need, and then walk back to the truck. If anyone gives you any trouble, start yellin’ your head off for help.”

  “I ain’t never had any trouble yellin’ my head off,” I replied, coaxing a grin out of him. “We’ll be okay.” But I felt less confident than I talked, and my heart skipped as I watched Momma and Daddy walk off.

  “‘Flour, sugar, cornmeal, salt’ . . .” I read nervously as Gemma and I walked together. “The same old stuff. I’ve gotta find me some work so I can get somethin’ good when we go shoppin’.”

  As we walked, I knew we were being stared at. We’d been stared at from the time our truck had pulled along the sidewalk. I just kept talking like nothing was different, hoping my chatter would keep Gemma from noticing the dirty looks we were getting. But my efforts didn’t matter at all, I knew. She was a smart girl even if she was quiet these days, and she could sense the hostility as much as I could. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw her put her head even lower than it had been. Instinctively I grabbed her arm to support her, but she yanked it away.